YARDLY DELAND — These graphics show a glimpse of the cottage-style homes that will be on offer at Yardly DeLand, formerly known as CTC DeLand, a multifamily housing development on DeLand's southeast side at the intersection of County Road 4101 and Cassadaga Road. The site plan for the 233-unit development was approved by the Planning Board in February 2023.
While work is underway to build new apartment units in Downtown
DeLand, the City of DeLand is working on another multifamily project on the city’s southeast side.
At its Feb. 15 meeting, the DeLand Planning Board OK’d the site plan
for Yardly DeLand with a 3-1 vote cast by a scant quorum of just four of the DeLand Planning Board’s seven members.
The concept for the project — formerly known as CTC DeLand — was
approved last October, but the project is big enough to warrant site-plan
approval from the Planning Board and City Commission, too.
Yardly DeLand is slated to bring 233 units of single and duplex “cottages” to 28 acres at the intersection of Cassadaga Road and the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Beltway. It will be kitty-corner from Century Dunes apartments, a complex just outside of DeLand’s city limits.
The 28 acres is within the Southwest Activity Center, an area on DeLand’s outskirts with a larger industrial development planned.
While Yardly DeLand is a multifamily development, it’s not traditional apartment-style housing.
“A horizontal apartment complex,” is how attorney Mark Watts, representing developer Taylor Morrison, described it.
Yardly DeLand would be owned by a single entity and the units would be rented like apartments, but the 700-square-foot one-bedroom units and the 1,000-square foot duplex units would more resemble “cottages,” Watts said.
Another word the attorney used to describe the plan was “luxury.”
“These are rental by choice. That’s kind of the market this is going to,” Watts said. “… a lot of people who are moving to the area and want to get a feel for it before they purchase a home, or people who want the flexibility to lock up and go travel, or things of that nature.”
The Planning Board approved the site plan 3-1, with Chair Virginia Comella and Planning Board members Harper Hill and Don Liska voting in favor, and Planning Board member Buz Nesbit dissenting.
The remaining members of the Planning Board were absent from the Feb. 15 meeting.
Nesbit’s chief concerns were about putting more cars at the already-busy intersection of County Road 4139 and the MLK Jr. Beltway. He wants to see the county do something about the intersection first.
“They need to address this, and wouldn’t it be nice to have them do it prior to the development instead of trying to catch up once it’s done?” Nesbit said. “It’s not the project I’m concerned about … it’s just the infrastructure. Once again, we’re getting the cart before the horse.”
Before construction can begin on Yardly DeLand, the City Commission will have to approve the project’s site plan on first and second readings.
The City Commission meets at 7 p.m. on the first and third Monday of every month in the City Commission Chambers at DeLand City Hall, 120 S. Florida Ave.
All meetings are open to the public, and are live-streamed on the city’s website, www.deland.org.
